Sunday, August 22, 2010

Witches in Colonial America

I've been digging into witchcraft lore lately -- partly to follow up on the Grace Sherwood case -- and I came upon a fascinating collection. Progenealogists.com, a genealogical research group based in Utah, has amassed a list of accused witches in Colonial America here. The vast majority of cases are in Massachusetts, but there are a fair handful in my state of Virginia. In Princess Anne, VA -- where Sherwood's case occurred -- Anne and John Byrd also faced accusations of witchcraft at the end of the 17th century. But according to the site here they sued their accuser for slander.

But here is the one that interests me the most:

Grady, Katherine d. 1654 at sea, VA 1654 H, at sea

The case happened somewhere off the coast of Virginia, and the "H" means she was hung (her date of death and the date of the case are the same for this reason).

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